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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS^ 

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<M/>. EMA.6.& \ ' i 



UNITED STATES "OP AMERI 



VALEDICTORY 



DELIVERED AT 



THE FORUM 



THE ELEVENTH DAY OF APRIL, 1811 



Closing the First Session. 



BY I. P. C. SAMPSON, ESQ, 



NEW-YORK: 



PRINTED BY VAN WINKLE, WILEY & C0., 
Printers to the University. 



1817. 



.^3 



Sir, 

In pursuance of a resolution unanimously passed at 
the last meeting of the Forum, we have the honour, in behalf of 
the Association, to express to you their thanks for your interest- 
ing and eloquent Valedictory Address, and to request a copy for 
publication. 

Permit us also, on this occasion, to express our high sense 
of the services you have rendered an institution, in the establish- 
ment of which, you bore a principal part, and to the reputation 
of which, ycur talents have so largely contributed. 

With sentiments of esteem and personal friendship, 
we remain 

your obedient servants, 

SAMUEL BERRIAN, 
ANSEL W. IVES, 
BENJ. HAIGHT, 
O. L. HOLLY. 

I. P. C. Sampson, Esq. 



Gentlemen, 

The complimentary expressions in your communica- 
tion are so far beyond my deserts, that you will permit me to re- 
ceive them, without reply, merely as the courtesy of the occasion. 

To have suggested the idea of the Forum is the only merit I 
can claim. Its reputation has been wholly owing to the talents 
and exertions of the members composing the Association. 

I have, 
Gentlemen, 

the honour to remain 

your most obedient humble servant, 
I. P. C. SAMPSON. 
Messrs. Berrian, Ives, Haight, and Holly. 



VALEDICTORY. 



LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 

I have been called on to perform a task which 
could have been more ably executed by many of 
my fellow members They have preferred hum- 
ble zeal to more distinguished claims. I am not 
insensible to the kindness of their partiality ; but, 
as the effect of that kindness alone, must beg leave 
to accept the honour they have done me. 

The object of our institution has been the cul- 
tivation of eloquence. I shall not enter into any 
argument to prove the dignity, or the utility, of the 
pursuit. It is the noblest gift that can distinguish 
man from man; nor is there any greatness so 
thoroughly inherent in the individual who pos- 
sesses it. In a free country it is power; and they 
who have eloquence carry with them, wherever 
they may go, the means of empire over their fellow 
men. In the pulpit, at the bar, or in the senate, 
we find them equally irresistible, rousing the 
feelings, rebuking the passions, swaying the minds, 
and controlling the convictions of mankind. 



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In the pulpit, eloquence is seen, not in the vain 
pomp of words, not in the glare of ornament, but 
in the holy ministry of comfort, or the solemn ex- 
position of a providence, damping the hardened 
brow of guilt, and extorting from the heart a testi- 
mony to its own corruptions. What subject can be 
capable of a more sublime effect than the religion 
that preaches liberty to the captive, and consolation 
to the distressed — that promises life in death, and, 
raising the eye of hope to heaven, dispenses the 
message of salvation to every condition, and to 
every clime. With how moving an appeal does it 
plead the cause of helpless infancy, or destitute old 
age, searching the bosom for every string that can 
be touched to pity, and bringing the gush of sym- 
pathy from the unfeeling heart, like water from the 
rock in the wilderness. 

When we behold the sacred orator detailing 
to his listeners the consolations of their faith, and 
the foundations of their hope, how full of wo the 
accents in which he depicts the agony and the 
sacrifice ; but when he celebrates the triumph and 
the victory, what holy fervour kindles in his eye, 
what joyful rapture dwells upon his tongue. His 
countenance becomes enlightened with his hopes ; 
heaven seems to open above his head the glory 
of the throne to be revealed. The heart melts 



7 



into tenderness, and the spirit of the dove, de- 
scending upon our understandings, brings with it 
in its wings the sublime emotions of a mysterious 
faith. 

But when he discourses on the uncertainty of 
life, which, like a ripple on the stream, vanishes 
on the eye while yet its murmur lingers in the ear, 
how awfully does he present the solemn hour 
when the last agony of nature closes- — the dews of 
dissolution stand gathering on the brow, and life 
flutters feebly in the expiring pulse. The distract- 
ed eye seems to inquire into the awful uncertainty 
before it— the agonizing hand grasps at the 
slightest thrill of sympathy, and the ear dwells 
upon the lightest breath that whispers mercy. 
Then, when every earthly trust is rent, and the 
drop of bitterness runs trickling over the soul, a 
voice is heard — the sinner listens — doubt and de- 
spair relax their grasp. Another pang — the 
throes of anguish cease — the darkness melts to 
light — a ray of mercy has found the soul strug- 
gling in the shadows of death — joy spreads along 
the features — the dimming eye beams with celes- 
tial hope — life is absorbed in a new existence, and 
the spirit feels the veil of mortality dropping fast 
from around it — the dying man sinks away in 
visions of eternal life, and the immortal spirit, rising 



3 



on the exulting wings of hope, springs through 
the boundless skies to meet her God. 

At the bar, we find eloquence vindicating the 
cause of justice, upholding the widow's right, and 
sheltering the unprotected helplessness of the 
orphan's cradle. A sword to the oppressor, a 
shield to the oppressed — the poor find in her a 
refuge against the power of the rich. Vice 
crouches in her eye, nor dares to raise her head 
beneath the uplifted scourge, while the guilty 
delinquent, writhing, pale, confused, stands self- 
condemned and trembling at her look. 

At times* it is true, her voice may be drowned 
by the chattering jargon of the obscene harpies of 
chicane ; but her triumph, though interrupted, can- 
not be withstood. Still she is seen wielding all 
the affections of the heart, marshalling them all 
on the side of virtue, and leading forth innocence 
in triumph from the throne of justice. When she 
pleads the cause of injured virtue, the desert 
home, the vanished smile, the fading form, how 
breathless the suspense. Emotion swells upon 
emotion. The tide of feeling rises till it overflows 
its fountains. In the undissembled sympathy of 
distress, the tear runs trickling down our cheek, 
and the heart swells to bursting with indignation 
at the villain's guilt. 



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In the senate, eloquence assumes a graver 
aspect. We behold her leading the councils of 
nations, and imprinting her sentences as axioms on 
the minds of men. Inspired by her, the states- 
man is seen silencing the clamours of factious 
tongues, and warning the public ministers into 
the path of duty. When he rises in the midnight 
debate every eye is fixed, every ear listens. 
Wearied attention fastens on his words. By de- 
grees, attention becomes astonishment, astonish- 
ment conviction. His hearers wonder at their 
former doubts; till, as he rises to the meridian of 
his eloquence, they lose themselves in transport 
and enthusiasm. The lofty spirit of independence 
is kept alive by his words ; the feeling of national 
honour kindles at his accents ; and when the sky 
is compacted into gloom, when the voice of na- 
ture's strife mutters among the mountains, and the 
warring surge swells threatening on the shore, un- 
disturbed and undismayed, he stands a fearless 
pilot at the helm, and rises with the wave, and 
rides upon the storm. 

But if we wish to contemplate the full tri- 
umph of eloquence, we must behold her in words 
on which freedom flings her breath, beseeching, 
threatening, animating; summoning nations to in- 
dependence, and calling on them to shroud the 

2 



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memory of their shame in the palms of glory. At 
her voice, the trance of slavery ends. Drooping 
humanity rears her head. The slave becomes the 
man. The burning tear stands brimming in his eye. 
The electric flash runs kindling, through his soul. 
The tomb sends forth a voice. The living wake to 
the remembrance of the glorious sires whom time 
has heaped in honored dust. The heart of the na- 
tion renews itself, and becomes one, in the universal 
sympathy; and the people, delirious with the 
draught of freedom, rush to destroy the hideous 
idols, on whose altars they had passed their chil- 
dren through the fire. Then, indeed, her breath is 
flame, and her words lightning, withering and 
scorching where they fall. It is then, that with 
swelling bosom bared to the storm, she stands in- 
voking the judgments of heaven in fiery wrath 
upon the oppressor's head, and speaks the ban of 
desolated nature on the destroyer's triumph. 

Eloquence is not of one age or country ; she 
has spoken with every tongue, and to every peo- 
ple. Nature inspires the unlettered native of 
the woods, and the feelings of his mind are repre- 
sented under the images she presents. Joy is the 
beam that cheers his prospect ; sorrow the cloud 
that darkens over his path. He hears a spirit in 
the roar of the cataract, and imagines a heaven 



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beyond his mountains. In perpetual communion 
with nature, he is familiar with every aspect she 
assumes, but loves her most in awful converse with 
the storm, when the clouds darken on the driving 
winds, when the forest groans, and the desert 
prowlers, stealing to their lairs with couched heads, 
await the pouring wrath of heaven. 

Such an unrestrained communion with nature 
gives an habitual elevation to their thoughts. 
When Tecumseh was told in council, that his 
white father presented him a seat, he exclaimed, 
" Your chief my father ! My father is the sun, and 
on the bosom of the earth, who is my mother, will 
I throw myself V 

Nor is eloquence only to be seen habited in the 
civil gown : often when the marshalled hosts are 
ranged beneath the lowering sky of battle, she is 
seen to flash amid the gloom, and give an omen to 
the fight. Soldiers ! Forty ages of glory behold 
you from the summits of those pyramids ! At that 
voice victory seemed to speak, and when the sun 
of Austerlitz rose on the heights of Mojaisk, the 
humblest soldier in the ranks acknowledged a 
dawn of glory, and received the augury of battle. 



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The triumphs of the orator are not confined to 
his own age alone. His words have a memory in 
them that long preserves the recollection of. the 
struggle made for freedom, and gives the triumph 
to the conquered, and brands the tyrant to poste- 
rity. Still we catch from Demosthenes the glow- 
ing spirit that animated Greece; still learn from 
Cicero to execrate the mean ambition that tri- 
umphed over the liberties of Rome. And if a tear 
have trickled to our eyes, or an honest glow kind- 
led in our bosoms, at the perusal, our hearts are 
enlarged and ennobled by the sympathy. 

[t is true, eloquence seems to have changed her 
character in modern times ; but the difference be- 
tween ancient and modern audiences easily ac- 
counts for this. With them oratory was more a 
matter of show, and spoke more to the senses; 
their climate, their living so much abroad, their 
speaking in the open air, their greater sensibili- 
ty to external impressions, their dress, the pic- 
turesque grandeur of the public buildings amidst 
which they spoke, the more perceptible melody 
of their language, the complexity of its syntax, 
rendering composition more difficult, and the re- 
lish for its felicities more exquisite, all combined 
to give it this character. In modern times, from 



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the more philosophical spirit of the age, we take 
bolder views, and touch upon greater topics. Less 
capable of external sensations, our moral impres- 
sions are deeper and more lasting. To these 
causes may be added, the nature of our religion, 
the romantic character of our early literature and 
traditions, and our greater familiarity with intel- 
lectual ideas and abstractions. Our knowledge of 
the literature of other nations, and our transfusion 
of their idioms into our own, permits us to take 
greater liberties with our style, and to practise 
bolder innovations upon our language. With a 
greater range of knowledge, we have a richer vari- 
ety of objects of illustration. Our imaginations are 
much better stored with images, whether of the 
interesting occasions that history presents, or the 
imposing grandeur of the scenes of nature. To all 
this may be added, that they were more recent 
in the world, and that objects that wore to them 
the inspiring freshness of novelty, assume in our 
eyes the sombrer hue of disappointment. In these 
later days, the imagination, in wandering through 
the twilight solitudes of time, is arrested by a 
thousand gray ruins breathing melancholy through 
the mind, in the associations they call up of vanish- 
ed greatness and departed splendour. 



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Still, with some slight modifications, true elo- 
quence is everywhere the same. The true orator 
is found in every community, and everywhere to 
be known by the same characteristics. The great 
orator is the great man of real life, and born for 
action. His imagination is not the fancy of the poet, 
nor like it loves to repose among its own visions ; 
nor his understanding like the mind of the philo- 
sopher, delighting in speculation, and satisfied with 
doubts for conclusions. A daring spirit, a deci- 
sive will, give impulse to the convictions of his 
mind. His arguments may be like the bow of Ulys- 
ses in the hands of common men, but in his own 
impel the shaft to the feather in the mark. The 
whole character of his mind is vehement reason. 
His eloquence is not the display of sentiment, or 
the subtilty of disputation, but the burst of feeling, 
and the flash of mind that carries conviction. In- 
genuity, which is the strength of weak minds, and 
acuteness, which is the pride of cunning ones, he 
disdains, and spurns a petty triumph. His true cha- 
racteristic is force, and he delights to exert it; 
like the tempest, swelling and rising with the roar 
of the chafed elements. The reed may wanton 
with the sun, and dally with the breeze ; the oak 
stiffens to the storm, and takes root in the whirl- 
wind. He trusts not to the glow of his colours, but 



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the boldness of his outline, and does not wait to 
finish minutely, but, like the painter, flings his 
brush at the picture, and calls out resemblance 
from the canvass at a single touch. He stands 
erect among his fellows, and feels himself born to 
enforce conviction, and assumes by the right of 
conquest, and dictates submission. Ever ardent, 
and like a rich stream conflowing with his own 
abundance, he tramples on the little difficulties 
of debate. He does not seek to delight his hear- 
ers, biit to hurry them into action. Doubt and 
hesitation vanish at his look, feebler minds pay ho- 
mage to the energy of his character, and, clinging 
to his protection, take their opinions from his eye, 
and acquire courage in the thunders of his voice. 
The tragic passions, terror and pity, are the 
springs of his eloquence. Inaccessible to any but 
the loftiest impulses of our nature, he ever as- 
sumes the noblest sentiments as furnishing mo- 
tives to action. The softer feelings he knows only 
to describe them, and calls forth tears from other 
men, but sheds none himself. He portrays human- 
ity in her greatest attitudes, and seizes nature in 
her grandest aspects. He does not go in pursuit 
of tropes or figures, but presents his thoughts in 
images, because more rapid and concise than 
words. With him declamation is argument warmed 
by passion; at one time exhibiting the march of a 



16 

majestic stream, at another the roar of an impetu- 
ous torrent. He is not eloquent upon every occa- 
sion, nor does he treat an indifferent subject with 
emphatic monotony, or fill up the pauses of argu- 
ment or passion with tiny flourishes of rhetoric, 
but rises with his subject ; and when the debate 
swells into tempest, shows the storm to be his 
element, and an arm to wield the thunderbolt. 

GENTLEMEN OP THE FORUM, 

On taking leave of you, permit me to congra- 
tulate you on the success of our institution. To 
speak of the talents it has called forth, after what 
we have heard to-night, would be superfluous. 
To enumerate all, would be impossible ; to parti- 
cularize, invidious. There are names among you 
that pronounce their own panegyric. 

We may, on closing our session, say, with honest 
pride, that, on the place from which I speak, im- 
portant questions have been discussed, truth has 
found advocates, and prejudice been refuted. We 
have not sacrificed the permanent interests, or 
future utility, of the institution, to any selfish con- 
sideration of individual vanity. No petty jea- 
lousy, no envious meanness, no unworthy art, 
no rivalry but generous emulation, no inter- 



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course but liberality ; we have sincerely sympa- 
thized with each other's success. 

LADIES AND GENTLEMEN, 

The attempts we have made this winter we 
consider merely as experiment, and the patronage 
we have received as far beyond our deserts. We 
come now to render up our trust in the institution. 
It has not existed for our own emolument. It was 
meant for the public. We thank you for your 
liberality. The spirit displayed in supporting 
this institution, permit me to say it, augurs favour- 
ably for New- York. It leads us to anticipate the 
time when, rising to her level in the union, she 
will be no less the seat of science than the great 
mart of trade. One topic you will allow me to 
touch upon. Our institution has been the means 
of dispensing your bounty to the orphan and the 
widow. If, then, the tear of human misery has 
been wiped away from a suffering eye, if com- 
fort has been shed on the infirmities of old age, if 
smiles have been called up on the cheek of honest 
poverty, or joy diffused through the languid 
pulses of the captive, I put it boldly to you, 
associated on such principles, are we not entitled 
to your support. 

3 



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On this occasion I feel that there are claims 
on the part of a portion of our audience, not to be 
passed over. 1 do not make this address for the 
purpose of idle compliment, but because the 
obligation has been felt, and we wish to ac- 
knowledge it. Sincerely do we feel our obligation 
to those whom we have ever considered as the 
real patrons of our institution— whose influence in 
society first gave reputation to our establishment 
— whose presence has supplied a motive to our 
exertions — an interest to our debates, and, by 
imposing a salutary restraint, elevated the charac- 
ter of our discussions. Night after night, we 
have seen intelligence, beauty, and fashion, in bril- 
liant array among our audience. We have, also, 
seen that respectable class of the community who 
could scarcely have been attracted by a merely 
idle curiosity, countenancing and giving character 
to our institution by their presence. 

It is time that prejudices, implicitly received 
only because unexamined, should be abandoned. 
The reunion of the two sexes, in the pursuits of 
knowledge, will be for the benefit of both. The 
gloomy pedant will be fashioned into refinement, 
the glittering female recalled from vain frivolities to 
the station of a thinking being. Nor is this impossi- 



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ble. True wisdom ever loves to sport in smiles ; wit 
may sparkle from a laughing eye, and knowledge 
abandon furrowed brows for dimpled cheeks. 
Beauty itself scarce attracts our homage till ex- 
pression sparkle in the eye, the soul of feeling 
kindle on the lip, and the smile of intelligence 
irradiate the countenance with the expression of a 
mind. 

At all times, literature is an innocent amuse- 
ment ; in adversity, a never failing refuge. At 
what source can we draw a purer consolation than 
at the fountain of knowledge, whose limpid wave 
leaves no repenting bitterness on the lip, and on 
whose mirror virtue beholds her own image re- 
flected pure as its untroubled waters. To fe- 
male superintendance is committed the important 
task of giving a direction to the first ideas that call 
forth the expanding intellect, and warm the open- 
ing heart ; and when the infant has grown up into 
the man, to whom can he look for the communion 
of mind but those without whom happiness is a 
dream, and the world a desert; whose idea 
comes associated in the mind with every hue of 
beauty and every breath of melody ; and whom 
the imagination delights to picture forth, pure as 
the timid flowret, glimmering in the star dew ; 
meek as the wild rose, bending and blushing to its 



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image in the mountain stream ; sweet as the open- 
ing violet, breathing incense on the morning's 
breath, or shedding fragrance on the sigh of eve- 
ning. 

Our bolder virtues require the glow of public 
life, and are nourished in the broad light of day. 
Theirs are seen to most advantage by the mild 
moonlight of domestic life, which gives a soften- 
ing grace to every beauty it reveals. But without 
the charm of mind, the interest of cultivated in- 
tellect, and the smile of polished intelligence, what 
were even home itself. The accomplished female, 
on the other hand, becomes the ornament of the 
social circle ; the best affections of the heart shed 
the air of paradise around her; the smile spreads 
from cheek to cheek around the happy hearth ; 
the voice of prattling innocence dispels the gloom 
of care, while the fond voice of affection, thrilling 
to the heart, awakens every sympathy with which 
nature has connected happiness. It is in scenes 
like these that the heart is formed to virtue ; and 
to the cultivation of the female intellect alone must 
we look to enjoy them. Blessed with such endear- 
ments, fortune may yield or withhold her smiles, 
but the mental sunshine beaming at the heart she 
cannot overcast ; and in the darkest hour of ad- 
versity, there yet remains the faithful asylum of a 



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wife's embrace, the partial fondness of a mother's, 
smile. 

I cannot think it necessary, on this occasion, to 
say any thing of the inducements that should fur^ 
nish motives to the study of eloquence. In this 
country, the necessity of public speaking is not 
confined to any particular class of men; every 
man may be called to the councils of the nation ; 
any man may address his fellow citizens. 

A republic is the true soil of eloquence. It is 
a plant that cannot flourish beneath the jealous 
shade of power. Its stem must draw vigour from 
a free soil, and its blossoms derive their fragrance 
from the chartered airs of heaven, and their beau- 
ty from the unintercepted light of day. Eloquence 
does not deign to impart her energies to the ti- 
morous tongues or faltering accents of slaves, and 
if she has spoken amongst them, it has been only 
where the throb of nature distended for a mo- 
ment the heart of the oppressed, and swelled 
against his chains and burst his bonds. 

When we consider the destinies of our country, 
we cannot doubt that on her soil eloquence will 
assert her genuine empire ; the interests of free- 
dom shall animate our debates, and the glory of 



22 



her achievements prompt the heart and inspire 
the tongue. On these shores the genius of inde- 
pendence, like the cherub with the flaming sword, 
shall guard the tree of liberty, while the arts and 
sciences shall spring beneath its branches, and 
bloom to repay its shade. Man shall rise to his 
rank in the creation ; his mind, undebased by pre- 
judice, and uncorrupted by ignorance, shall dis- 
play all its powers. Truth shall no longer lie hid 
in fiction, but revealing herself to eyes accustom- 
ed to her radiance, lay all her secrets open to the 
calm research of reason. The muses shall settle 
on our shores, and often exiled, like their last 
abode the best ; and wreathing every bud of sci- 
ence with every bloom of art, twine the imperish- 
able garland round the brows of Columbia, and bid 
them exhale their sweets to a long and late pos- 
terity. Literature shall refine without corrupting ; 
her spotless page, pure as the silver chord upon 
her lyre, the vestal flame upon her altar. The 
poet shall aspire to heaven, and snatch from the 
roll of fame the name of the hero to burn along his 
glowing verse. Marble hewed from native quarries 
shall rise in monuments above the brave, or chisel- 
ed by the hand of art, transmit to posterity, in 
frowning majesty, the features of the hero or the 
patriot. The gloomy forest shall yield to the stur- 
dy stroke ; the voice of gladness waken in the 



23 



wild, and nature smile to yield up her treasures 
to the hand of toil. The light of glory shall pour 
in floods of day along our land. While nature 
spreads her verdure on the plains of Bridgewater 
or Chippewa; while Niagara thunders from the 
steep, our triumphs shall have a memory; and 
while ocean rolls his waves, shall slumber in the 
calm and lighten in the storm. 

Then shall eloquence display all her powers. 
Virtue shall hear a triumph in her voice. Its 
thunders shall roll terror over the head of guilt, 
and its lightnings flash dismay upon the eye of 
faction. Then shall our country's triumphs be 
sounded forth in strains, glorious as the trump of 
heaven, and her wrongs inspire advocates, whose 
every vein shall thrill with patriotism, whose eve- 
ry pulse shall beat true to national honour, whose 
every thought shall rise swelling from the heart, 
and come glowing to the lip. A greener verdure 
shall spread over the warrior's wreath, a purer 
lustre tremble in the tear that consecrates the he- 
ro's memory; and while with rapid tongue she 
pours forth the eloquence of thought, and the ora- 
tory of the soul, the pulse shall beat quicker in the 
veins, and a bolder lustre in the eye proclaim the 
awakened energies of the heart. 



Jo, 



/ 



